


The Devil's Due

by April_Valentine



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Angst, Fix-it fic, M/M, Spoilers, or rather pre fix-it fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-23
Updated: 2013-11-23
Packaged: 2018-01-02 11:16:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1056118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/April_Valentine/pseuds/April_Valentine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was inspired by the events of the Endgame arc, primarily "The Crossing" and the preview interviews by the cast with promo clips for "The Devil's Share" which will air Tuesday, November 26, 2013. So spoilers for those episodes and the promo. This is my attempt to fix what I feel was the retconning of the Reese/Finch relationship in "The Crossing" and a pre-emptive fix for "The Devil's Share."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Devil's Due

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [The Devil‘s Due 恶魔之约](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1058383) by [LeeDD](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeeDD/pseuds/LeeDD)



When it is over, John is cold. When it is over and Simmons is dead, John is cold. His hands are cold, his wounds are cold. His eyes are cold. Simmons is dead. But Joss is dead too. And so he is cold. 

Alone, he somehow finds himself back at his loft. He strips off his filthy suit and shirt and steps into the shower, thinking to warm himself that way. He is so deeply tired. So much in pain. He is almost too weak to wash and can only stand under the spray. At first, its heat feels good, but as he half heartedly soaps himself, mind blessedly blank, he stands there too long, time stretching out, until there is no warmth left in the water streaming down over him. He begins to shake, but his mind is so numb he does not think about getting out. 

The cold is all there is now. Simmons is dead. Joss is dead. And the rest… he knows he has broken the rest. Shown his true colors, betrayed promises he never said aloud. He’s not even sure how it happened. One day, he was happy. One day, they were together. A pact made two years ago was being honored. If he died, he knew that Finch wouldn’t be lost. Shaw was here now. She would continue to help him.

But then he found himself in a morgue with Joss, alone with no hope of escape, and he thought it was the end. He found himself saying things he had vowed he would take to his grave… but with his grave looming before him, with Finch unable to hear, he put voice to them. His emotions, usually so carefully guarded, flowed free and he’d even kissed her. He hadn’t meant it to happen and he hadn’t thought beyond that night about what it could mean if they survived. But he had never thanked her, not really, for the role she had played in saving him. So he had spoken. He had thought that at least if he died that night, he wouldn’t have to regret not letting her know how much her friendship had meant to him. 

They had survived though. Finch and Fusco and Shaw had somehow engineered another miracle and though he’d ended up in jail again, he had thought everything would be all right. She had come to get him released and he’d been sitting there holding a plastic cup of water and déjà vu had kicked in and there they were, repeating word for word the things they’d said the night they’d met. 

It had been fun, when that first night, it had been painful and complicated. Was he flirting? John didn’t think so, didn’t think she was either. Not really. But at least they weren’t all awkward because of that kiss… they were happy and joking now that she had won her battle and both of them had survived. 

Then later, when they had been relaxed and let their guard down, it had happened. John blamed himself. If only they’d replayed the time he’d commended her for wearing her vest when her snitch had tried to kill her. If only they hadn’t taken his when they arrested him. 

He’d felt Simmons’ bullets hit him, but then she was falling, bleeding, dying in his arms. Finch had been there, pulling him away from her lifeless body, but from then on, everything had gone dark and unfocused. And cold. He was so cold.

He’d known only that he couldn’t let Simmons live. He was a bully killer and he’d let this particular bully go too many times. He couldn’t let himself think. If he did, he would wallow in regret over the chances to end Simmons he’d passed up. He had lost enough time having his wounds tended to find him right away, but the thing about scorched earth is, eventually you find your prey.

Distantly, in a place he’s pushed so far down inside he can’t see or examine it, he knows he’s gone too far. Lost one friend. Pushed away the other. The one who, if he let himself think, meant even more to him. 

Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me, he thinks now, shivering under the cold shower. I cannot have more than one friend. If I tell one I care, I have to sacrifice the other.

_I need to find my friend. I only have the one…_

Should have remembered that. Should have been true to him… 

Mistakes are nothing new to John, but this time, the ones he’s made these last few days, hurt more than all the rest. He feels warmth on his face, tastes salt on his lips.

No. Can’t feel. Can’t hurt. Numb… have to be numb. 

He steps further under the freezing stream of water, washing away the tears, the feelings. Cold. Better to be cold. 

Gun in my hand is cold. Dead bodies in front of me are cold. I feel nothing when I kill. I love my work….

**** 

Harold has been looking for John for hours. He had broken off contact days ago. All he could do was worry and wait and try to avoid catastrophe. Shaw had told him she was in, but asked if he was ready for what was going to happen. He hadn’t been able to answer. Root had told him it wasn’t too late for John. Desperate, he had released her. Put a new kind of team together to avenge the loss of the old. He had only wanted one thing: John, alive. Safe. Back with him. Not dead. Not in prison for murder either.

Can I forgive him, he wonders now as he approaches the door to the loft. He flashes on John’s birthday, giving him the key, realizing later he hadn’t given him the address with it and wondering if he’d ever see him again after he’d gone off on his own to find Marshall Jennings. 

He hears the words he’d said to Detective Carter that terrible night again, when he had begged her to find John for him.

_I can’t reach him. Or stop him._

It had been the same these last few days. Only worse. John always took it personally when someone hurt a woman, or bullied anyone who couldn’t defend themselves, but someone he cared about as much as Joss? Harold had stood there, unwilling witness to her death in John’s arms, terrified witness to the change that had come over him.

Even at his lowest, John hadn’t been this bad. He had been wounded, in pain, but the emotional break down had been worse. Ineffective as always in such situations, Harold had not been able to help him. And when he’d gone off on his own… 

Damage control had been the only thing on his mind. He had pushed his feelings aside, having no time to second guess John or to plan on arguing with him. Simmons’ number came up. He was committed to saving the numbers. But if the number was the perpetrator? Wasn’t it his duty to stop them from the crime they were about to perpetrate?

Only Simmons had already perpetrated his worst crime. Now he was going to be the victim. _We don’t judge, Ms. Shaw._

What would Nathan say about this? Had he ever considered it could get like this? That the conundrum would wind around and around so tightly you could never figure out what was right and what was wrong? Harold wanted to scream at Nathan now, tell him how this is the very thing he’d feared. If you tried to play God, one day you would face the inevitable impossible choice. 

Save Simmons? Stop John? Neither was acceptable. 

Don’t make me choose, he had wanted to scream at John. But he knew John wouldn’t listen. Even when thinking clearly, John didn’t listen to Harold’s fine points. Now, he couldn’t listen at all.

Harold realizes he can’t scream at either one of them, Nathan or John. Not that it would have made any difference to either man. Shaking his head, he uses his key to unlock John’s door.

The shower is running. Harold sees the crumpled suit on the floor. He stands awkwardly in the center of the main room, unsure he should be here. John doesn’t want to see him now. Maybe not ever.

He’s not even sure he wants to see John. 

He’s here though. He shouldn’t walk away. There was a time he could have. Other times in his life he did. He should do the same now. He could still do the work, he has Shaw and Fusco and… 

He cut that thought off before it could form. He hadn’t wanted to allow Root to help them. But John had given him no choice. 

She could communicate with the Machine in a way he never could. And despite all his attempts to block the idea, he admitted now that he was jealous. Frustrated. Hurt. When he was the one who had cut off communication with it a long time ago, for what had seemed at the time to be the best of reasons. 

But John couldn’t be the contingency now. He was about to be the perpetrator. Harold had had to code on the fly, use Root as his contingency, fatally insane though she was. He had never, in his wildest speculations, thought John could do that to him.

Jealous. Harold shivered at the idea, trying to deny that he could or even should feel jealous of John’s feelings for Detective Carter. It seemed petty. Rude. Disrespectful. John was allowed to feel loyalty toward someone else. Wasn’t he? 

If that was what John wanted, Harold should step aside. But it was too late for that, too late to pretend he would gladly make way for a relationship between John and Joss. And when he’d tried to comfort John, his sympathy had been pushed away. 

John was a stranger to him. With cold eyes and deadly intent. 

Some relationships aren’t meant to last. 

He’d been speaking of other relationships when he’d said that to John. He had really never believed theirs would end, unless in the way he’d imagined since the beginning. _Sooner or later, we’ll both probably end up dead. Really dead this time._ He’d been content to leave it at that. 

Harold wonders how he could still be naïve after all he’d seen and done. If he had the strength right now, after the last few days, he’d laugh at himself. 

If he knew where the Machine was, he’d tear it apart with his bare hands. 

He glances at his watch. He’s been here for ten minutes and the shower is still going. Should he check on John? Make sure he’s all right? 

He couldn’t walk in on him. He didn’t have the right.

He walks to where the dark suit lies thrown carelessly and bends to pick it up. His back hurts, his neck hurts. He ignores the pain the way he always does.

The suit is ruined. John won’t want to see it when he comes out of the shower. Harold finds a garbage bag and stuffs the clothes into it, then hides the bag under the sink. He waits, glances at his watch again. 

The shower is still running.

He is standing by the sink. There’s a kettle on the stove. He fills it with water, turns the gas on under it. He opens a cupboard to find tea. 

John keeps some sencha green here for him. Instead, Harold pulls out a bag of strong oolong and places it in a mug. John will be tired. Tea will help. 

Or it will be refused. And Harold will be asked to leave.

He has to try though. He’s here. He has to do something while he waits. 

The water boils. He fills the mug and waits while the tea steeps. It’s not good to use such hot water with green tea, but with this it won’t hurt. He takes out the tea bag, adds sugar and milk to John’s taste. And waits.

The shower is still on. He looks at his watch again. Fifteen minutes now since he came in. And John was in there when Harold arrived. The water heater was high capacity but… John had probably been in there much longer.

Is he all right? Overcoming his reticence, Harold approaches the bathroom. The door is ajar. 

There is no steam coming from the room.

“John?”

No answer.

He clears his throat, tries to speak up. “It’s Mr. Finch.” Always fall back on formality, he tells himself. When all else fails, there is always that artificial distance that implies comfort and civility.

Still no answer.

“John,” he calls, louder this time. “It’s Harold. Are you in there?” Of course he was in there. Even John Reese wouldn’t devise an elaborate charade by leaving his clothes on the floor and the shower running to fool Harold into thinking he was home. Or would he?

“John, are you all right?” He pushes the door open far enough to see inside. 

Relieved, Harold leans against the door frame. He can see John’s silhouette through the frosted glass of the shower door. 

“I… I’ve been looking for you. I wanted to make sure… “ What? That you’re all right? That you’re still talking to me? That I’m still talking to you? “I made tea.” Harold has never heard himself sound more ineffectual.

John doesn’t answer. His silhouette doesn’t move. 

He wouldn’t put a mannequin in the shower, would he? Harold’s brain asks even as he feels more foolish by the minute. The water is beating down on the motionless form.

This isn’t right. Either John is doing a really good job of ignoring Harold – in which case he should just turn around and walk away right now and never contact him again – or something is terribly wrong.

He pushes off the door frame and strides into the room. He slips. The floor is wet. The shower door isn’t closed all the way and the water that has been running for so long is leaking out onto the marble tiled floor. Harold grasps the door handle and opens it.

If he’d been thinking more clearly, he’d realize how dangerous this act could be. John Reese was not a man you snuck up on and surprised in the shower. A second before the door revealed John to him, he thought how the man could simply turn, grab him and break his neck. He might not even realize where he was, what he was doing, who was approaching him.

Or maybe he does know it’s Harold and breaking his neck is his plan all along. 

John doesn’t move. Harold releases the breath he’d taken. Looks him over.

John’s not leaning against the wall, as he’d half imagined him to be. Instead, he is ramrod straight, a bar of soap in his left hand that hangs at his side. His eyes are open but unseeing. The water is freezing.

It is as if John had simply frozen there, lost in the act of showering, forgetting what he was doing when a new ice age took place. Someday, if Harold didn’t do something, archaeologists would dig down through miles of ice and discover this tall naked man who’d died instantly in his shower when the world had frozen over.

He reaches out and turns off the water. The sudden silence seems full of echoes.

“John.” He is afraid to touch him, but he has to. 

John’s arm feels frigid. “John, please.” 

His face is vacant, eyes dead. The soap falls from his hand and lands with a thud that sounds loud in the silence. His body starts to tremble minutely. 

Harold reaches for a towel, wraps it around his shoulders. “Let’s get you out of here,” he murmurs. He tugs at John’s arm, meets resistance.

“It’s going to be okay, John,” he whispers, knowing in his heart that it’s a lie. He takes firm hold of John’s shoulders, turning him. There is blood running down his chest.

“You’ve started your wounds bleeding,” he says, hearing the sorrow in his own voice. Hurt and betrayed as he feels, this is John before him. Nearly comatose from grief and pain, and Harold realizes that putting away his soiled clothes and making tea isn’t going to be enough. He can’t keep his distance, doesn’t know why he ever thought he could.

It takes a few moments, but with urging and using his strength, he gets John to turn and step out of the shower, glad it’s a walk-in instead of a tub shower so he doesn’t have to get John to step up to get out, knowing that could have resulted in both of them falling. 

John moves at Harold’s prodding, but still says nothing, only following the urging of Harold’s hands. He pushes John down to sit on the toilet lid and pats at him with the towel, trying to dry him off. His own hands are starting to shake and he isn’t very effective. John appears not to mind.

Harold leaves the towel around John’s shoulders and opens the medicine cabinet. Getting out gauze and tape, he wets a wash cloth and dabs off the blood that was trickling down John’s chest, worrying about how much he’s lost in the last few days. He tapes fresh bandages over the seeping wounds and looks again at John’s face.

Water is leaking into his eyes from his wet hair. His expression is blank and his lips are blue. Beneath the blankness, Harold can see more pain and sadness than he could have ever imagined.

He dries John’s hair as best he can. He can feel how frozen his body is even beneath the towels he’s using to dry him. John’s teeth start to chatter. Harold lifts one limp hand to dry it off; the fingers are prune-like, cold as death. 

He glances up to the wall switch and locates the control for the heat lamp. Turns it on. It hums to life and begins to warm the room, its artificial glow casting shadows over John’s unshaven face. He looks gaunt, all angles and sharp outlines. His cold flesh seems translucent, thin, vulnerable.

Under the heat lamp, John’s shivering slows. He’s drier, warmer, but Harold knows the cold is bone deep, soul deep, in him. He sees there are droplets clinging to John’s eyelashes. Their length has fascinated Harold for over two years. He remembers John fluttering them against his cheek at night like hummingbird wings. Harold has a sudden impulse to kiss the wetness away from them now, but it makes his heart ache and his stomach clench. He uses a fresh towel to dry John’s face, hoping that will be enough to take the water – or is it tears? – from his lashes. He blots the stubble over his jaw too, and that makes John react, finally, a soft negative sound, denial or pain, coming from his throat. 

“It’s going to be okay, John,” Harold says again. Maybe if he says it enough, it will be true. John’s head sags, his chin nearly falling to his chest. Another time, Harold would have lifted his chin, made John look into his eyes, tried to convince him. Now, he just hangs up the wet towels and finds John’s robe hanging on the back of the door. 

He tries to get John to slide his arms into the sleeves, but he can’t manage it. Giving up, he just drapes it over his shoulders and urges him to his feet. “Let’s get out of here so you can rest,” he says softly, unsure if he’s being heard or not.

He walks John over to his bed. John seems content to stand while Harold throws back the covers, then allows himself to be pushed into a sitting position on the mattress. He doesn’t look up when Harold stands a moment to gaze down at him.

Sighing, Harold returns to the counter where he left the mug of tea he’d made. It’s cool enough now for John to drink, if he’ll try, but still warm enough to do him some good. At least Harold hopes so. He returns to the bed and offers the tea.

No reaction. 

“John. You need to drink this,” he says letting his frustration show a little, hoping that might make John respond. When he doesn’t, Harold sits next to him, holding the mug to his lips. “You can’t ignore me forever. Drink.”

After a moment, John opens his lips, swallowing some of the tea. Harold watches his adam’s apple work in his throat. It looks painful, as if John hasn’t had anything in him in days and Harold realizes it’s probably true. John’s frowning now, hand coming up as if to push the mug away.

“A little more and then you can rest.” Harold holds the mug to his mouth again. The taste John accepts this time is even smaller. 

“John, you’re really trying my patience,” he says.

A gasp. “I know. You’re angry with me.” The voice is nothing more than a hollow rasp. 

“And I’ll be a lot angrier if you don’t drink all of this tea,” he says. Maybe the soldier in John would respond to a direct order, he thinks. He wants to shout at him, shake him, make him talk to him. But it ‘s too late for talk. Maybe too late for everything.

John makes to take the mug from him, but his hands are trembling, so Harold has to hold onto it, help him. The gesture feels intimate yet uncomfortable. He’s taken care of John before, but he’s always felt nothing but deep caring and compassion. Now, his emotions are confused; he’s torn with misgivings and reproach he dares not voice. If he were to say the things he’s been thinking for the last few days, he knows there would be no way they could repair their relationship. The only thing Harold can say with any truth right now is that he does want to repair it. He just isn’t sure it’s possible.

When John finishes the tea, Harold escapes to the kitchen area to put the mug in the sink. Sitting next to him, feeling the almost palpable grief coming off John in waves was more than he could handle. They’d seen each other through some tough times in the last two years, but this time… this isn’t something that can be bandaged and allowed to heal while they move on. They are just too far apart. Aside from getting John out of the shower and plying him with tea, Harold isn’t sure there’s really anything he can do for the man. He’s not sure John wants him to do anything for him. 

He almost stops to wash out the mug, but knows that’s only a way to waste time and delay the inevitable. He takes a deep breath, planning on telling John he’s going to leave, and turns.

John is sitting as he was a moment ago, head down, hands drooping at his sides, but the robe has fallen from his shoulders, pooling around him on the bed, hanging open to reveal his bandaged chest and bare legs. 

“John…” The word slips out, all Harold’s pent up anguish and love too plain in his voice. 

John doesn’t look up, doesn’t respond. He’s gone again, like he was in the shower, drifting back into whatever distant place he’d gone to escape his pain. 

And Harold can’t stand it. His right hand reaches out as if to touch, though he’s too far away. He knows there are no words he can say, no comfort he can offer, no anger he can vent that will make any difference whatsoever. But he cannot bear to see the pain wracking John. He simply cannot walk out the door and leave him like this. 

He takes one step and then another, approaching John as one might approach a rabid animal that may or may not be playing dead. If he walks out now, he knows that, while there may be continued pain for both of them, pain would be all they would ever have. 

Abruptly he hears John’s voice in his head, that first day in the library when John found the board, the social security numbers, the news clippings.

_“And all these represent…?”_

_“Lost chances.”_

He can’t survive any more lost chances. 

Or maybe he hadn’t. Maybe they are both already dead, and this is a dream. So it won't matter what he does, because it's not real. 

He’s by the bed now. His hand reaches out, touches John’s shoulder. It’s still so cold under Harold’s fingers. 

Cold as death. Yes.

Harold draws his hand back, rubbing his other one against it, trying to generate warmth. He thinks the cold emanating from John’s body has affected him. 

But no, even if he’s dead, Harold isn’t cold, not as cold as John. Getting him out of the shower and making tea isn’t enough. He has to make him warm. That won’t take words. It won’t take code. But he can do it.

Wordlessly, Harold strips off his suit jacket, unbuttons his vest and slips it off too. He drapes both at the foot of the bed and loosens his tie, then moves on to his shirt. Once unbuttoned, he unclasps his cuff links and draws his shirt off, leaving it and his tie in a pile with his other clothes. He drops his cuff links into his pants pocket. John still doesn’t look up or even register that Harold is there.

Harold finishes undressing as fast as he can, trying not to think. If he stops to think, he’ll see how foolish he looks, how terrible this could be, how much he’ll regret giving into his love for John now when his anger is still so fresh and painful in his mind. But it’s not his mind that John needs now. It’s his heart and his body and Harold cannot stop himself from offering them to him.

Naked, he kneels in front of John, taking both of his cold hands between his own. John shivers, his head turning to the side as if trying to draw away from Harold’s presence. His eyes sink closed, lashes trembling. There are glistening droplets in them again. Harold knows they aren’t water from the shower this time.

“We won’t talk. We don’t have to,” Harold whispers. He leans up, kisses John’s impossibly long lashes, tasting salt and regret, but aching inside at the contact, tenderness welling up inside him that he can’t resist or deny.

He stands, gently pushes John back to lie down, lifting his legs up to the mattress. Then he crawls over him, covering him with his body, trembling as their skin makes contact. It feels like the first time, when they both had been so reticent and uncertain. It feels like yesterday, even though it has been weeks. Desire and necessity had conflicted for them and they had tried so hard to focus only on the numbers, the job. Caring for each other had to come last on the list, their happiness had seemed unfair in a world with so many problems needing their attention.

Harold is shaking now, with long restrained passion. He kisses John’s lips, nuzzling at them, slipping his tongue into the unresponsive mouth, wanting to cry out his need and beg John to know him. 

There is a reaction finally, just the barest hint of John’s tongue tip reaching for Harold’s, but it’s like dawn breaking, the sun coming out. Harold deepens the kiss, drawing John’s tongue into his mouth, trying to temper his hunger as he sucks on it, the wet life it represents making stars burst behind his closed eyes. 

A groan comes from John’s mouth, raw pain, denial. Harold relents, letting go, and lifts up to rain kisses down over his face, butterfly light, tempting, beseeching. John doesn’t protest further, so Harold takes that a sign. He moves down over John’s jaw to this throat, washing the rough skin with his tongue, willing the warmth of his mouth into John’s frozen flesh. He licks over John’s adam’s apple, tongue delving into the hollow of this throat, sucking the skin gently, wanting to mark, but afraid, so afraid. There are so many marks on John already and he doesn’t have the right to put a mark of his own upon this man now.

He sighs, resting his cheek against John’s right pec, hand smoothing up and down his chest and stomach. 

“You…” John’s voice is a croak. He coughs, tries again. “You don’t want me, Harold.”

He looks up, needing to see if John is meeting his eyes. But his lids are still closed, his face turned away. His voice is unutterably sad.

“It looks like you don’t want me,” Harold whispers back. If John asks him to, he will dress and leave. And never return. “I’m sorry.” He starts to push up from the bed.

A long, deep, aching sigh. “I need you.” John closes a trembling hand over Harold’s wrist. “I’m… dead inside….”

“It just feels that way right now,” Harold tells him. It might be a lie, it might be wrong. But at the moment, he believes it’s the truth. “Let me help you.”

John’s hand moves, weak and uncoordinated, just grazing Harold’s cheek. “Yes…” Spent, his hand falls away. Harold looks up, sees tears seeping from beneath John’s closed lids. 

He goes back to where he’d started, kissing them away, using only gentleness and fond memory to care for John, to show him he is still alive, still treasured, even if they didn’t have the words, even though the pain is still too fresh. Like the way he felt about Nathan, loving the man even while he felt so frustrated and betrayed by him, he kisses John’s face, willing to go meet him at a ferry that might blow up at any second, memories enough to sustain him at this moment and forever.

He kisses his way down John’s nose and over his dry, trembling lips, over his rough chin and jaw, down the length of his neck, nuzzling against his smooth throat, feeling him swallow back the hurt beginning to bubble to the surface.

He reaches up, leaning over him, hands on either side of John’s face. “No, no don’t do that,” he begs. “Just feel. Don’t think. Let that be later. Just feel for now. You just need to get warm.”

John is panting, face crumpled with anguish. Harold pets his cheek, near tears himself to see his once proud warrior so demoralized. 

He has to check again, can’t take advantage of John this way, no matter how much he thinks he can help him. “Okay?”

John’s eyes open, red-rimmed and tormented, but blue and deep and beautiful. “Please.” He breathes the word out, searching Harold’s gaze with a look that goes straight to his heart. 

He covers John’s mouth with his own, his kiss as tender and sweet as he can make it. Time spins out, he doesn’t care what’s happened this week, only that this is John, needing him, asking for him. 

John’s response is real, Harold can feel it through the brokenness and exhaustion. It’s all right. He remembers John taking charge when he was in too much pain to fully reciprocate. This time he will do the same for John.

His lips trail down over John’s shoulders, avoiding the fresh wound on the left, skipping down to find the soft skin on the inside of his elbow, following down his forearm to his wrist, where he licks and sucks lightly, finding his pulse, proof he is alive under Harold’s questing lips. He presses kisses into John’s rough palm, then licks and sucks at each finger, before moving on to the other hand and treating it to the same slow, precise attention. Moving upward next, he nibbles his way up John’s right arm, finally arriving at his uninjured shoulder. So strong, so broad, so bowed with heavy despair now.

Harold moves on, not letting himself think too much, remembering what he had told John. He kisses down over his chest, licking each nipple into a tempting bud, sucking just at the edge of wantonness, backing off from passion, knowing John can’t handle anything but the sweetness he’s offering.

He keeps his hands moving too, softly rubbing, petting, warming, like writing code that would tell John he was alive and loved and needed. He mouths down over John’s hip, over the scar from Mark Snow’s bullet and as he nuzzles into his groin, John’s legs fall further open, giving him full access, needing him.

He gathers the soft, damp penis into his hand, so different now from the times it has stood erect and dripping in Harold’s hold. Harold wants to gasp at the memories that sweep over him, biting back the sound lest it disturb John.

 _So beautiful when hard, so thick inside of him. He loves John’s dick inside him, but he loves to come inside John too, breathless as John pulls his hand around so Harold can stroke him to completion while riding him. John could use his own hand to finish himself, but it’s Harold’s touch he craves…._

Harold touches him now, handling him carefully, heart rending at the chill in the flesh he’s caressing. He leans down, opening his mouth to suck John in. He tastes clean and tender, moist from his prolonged shower but not seeping fluid, not yet. Harold fights back self doubt, telling himself this isn’t about orgasm, only about comfort. John is here, this is his essence, his manhood, his being, the center of all physical feeling. Harold uses every secret he’s ever learned about John now, licking, sucking, attempting to bring sensation back into his hurting body, solace to his aching mind. He mouths lightly up and down his length, sucking just the glans, tongue swirling over and around the spongy flesh, drawing off to nip just under the rim where he was cut, too young to remember, and where still the most feeling resides. 

John makes a soft “oh” of response and Harold proceeds, still at the measured pace he set, despite the slight hardening he can sense beginning. He sucks John all the way into his mouth, fingers caressing his groin and lower, and he feels John’s body relax, going from simple lassitude to willing tranquility. 

Harold continues, using his mouth, adding his fingers now as John’s length swells, becoming harder to contain. Harold is down between John’s thighs, his knees bent under him, neck strained, back protesting, but all of that insignificant in the face of John’s response. John’s legs move, his knees bending, thighs coming up as if to embrace Harold, who is moving up and down on his erection, lips taut, breathing hard through his nose, all focus centered on John, only John, John forever and always.

With a broken cry, John comes. Harold swallows and swallows, eyes tearing, heart full. John’s life, in his mouth. _We’re alive, both of us!_ Shocked, he realizes he’s coming too, when he hadn’t even sensed his own arousal. Before he can marvel over the way their bodies are attuned, it’s over . All too soon, John subsides, legs falling open as his body collapses back down to the mattress. Harold continues to nuzzle the spent organ, wishing their time wasn’t numbered, wishing their world was peaceful, wishing nothing had ever changed.

A fine sweat has broken out on John’s body. He’s trembling again. Harold isn’t sure if he’s okay or not, but he can’t bring himself to ask. He straightens himself out, body aching, and grabs for the covers as he moves up to lie next to John. He makes sure he’s as close as he can get to him, trying to share his meager warmth. John seems uncoordinated still, arms trying to reach for Harold but unable to manage. Harold puts his own arms around John instead. He wipes tears from John’s face with his fingers, trying to determine if he looks any more peaceful. His face is tired, worn, only a little less blank, but Harold counts that as a small success. John doesn’t open his eyes.

Harold tries to get comfortable, tugging a pillow under his neck while keeping close by John, arm draped across his chest. 

He’s just about to drift to sleep when John speaks, his voice still nothing more than a rough whisper.

“I understand if you’re still angry with me.” 

Harold takes a breath, lets it out. 

“I know.” He pauses. Moments ago, they were here, alive, together. It would be better if they weren’t, he thinks. If they were dead, there would be no more pain. Or if this were a dream, they could wake up as if nothing had put a rift between them. “I understand if you feel differently too,” he finally murmurs. “But we don’t have to think about that now. For now, just rest.”

 

###

**Author's Note:**

> This is the video that sparked my writing this fic:
> 
> http://www.cbspressexpress.com/cbs-entertainment/video?watch=9wvv2yyb4n
> 
> In it, Plageman states more than once that the effects of grief and the fact that because Simmons is the new number, one of the team could be the perpetrator, could cause a rift between the team members and possibly Reese and Finch.
> 
> And yes, readers familiar with my work will notice I've written another shower scene. I'm really not obsessed with showers. It just seemed to fit here.


End file.
